


Codename Godzilla

by Persephone_Kore



Series: Grandchildren [2]
Category: The Avengers (2012), Thor (2011)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-23
Updated: 2012-11-23
Packaged: 2017-11-19 07:36:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/570792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Persephone_Kore/pseuds/Persephone_Kore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: "Jörmungand does not appreciate giant alien space whale things invading his territory, shedding <s>fleas</s> Chitauri all over his planet. He decides to protest most vehemently, by taking out the interlopers and then going directly to the source..." -- purplemoon3</p><p>Sequel to "Grandchildren," written for a separate prompt, but I tried to make it readable as a standalone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Codename Godzilla

The tesseract portal churned, yawning, above the jutting height of Stark Tower. Fury sprinted away from the viewscreens still showing the idiot Council, stopping only to seize a rocket launcher, aware that two pilots were rushing through the preflight checks to go out and nuke their own city. 

The helicarrier lurched sideways. Fury staggered and slammed against a doorway. The flight crew babbled and swore over the comm. The plane that had started moving skidded, veered, and shot off in the wrong direction with the pilot struggling to recover control.

A black-green wall shot up past them -- the wind jarred them again -- and then paused to whip down and delicately pluck the reeling fighter plane out of the air. It deposited the plane on the deck and then opened its mouth toward the city, swaying far enough away that they could take in its shape. A gigantic snake's head hissed defiance toward New York City, and skyscraper-sized fangs gleamed white against the sky. 

"This is my home," said a voice that made the atmosphere shake, "and I defend it." 

The head shot off toward the city, trailed by a body that arched through the air with no apparent effort, and plunged through the portal. 

The body kept coming. It rose up from the sea, and ships staggered off course in a wake that stretched across the Atlantic. It kept coming, and ships in harbor settled onto damp ground as the sea level fell. Scales blurred past them. It kept coming, and seaweed and sand and chunks of solid rock fell off it like so much powder. 

"What _is_ that?" Fury asked no one in particular. "Godzilla?"

"I'm not sure," Hill said, sounding more rattled than he'd ever heard her. "But I think it's on our side." 

It halted at last. Reports started coming in from the city that the Chitauri had all dropped like rag dolls. The sea rose again -- gradually, but waves battered the coast. The length was coming out of the portal faster than it sank into the water, now; it must be, because more of it was accumulating in the air. 

The head emerged at last and hovered over the tower. The portal fizzled shut. And everyone heard a rumbling deep bass say, "Hello, Father. Did you forget I was here?" 

\-----

" _Father?_ " Steve repeated incredulously. 

When the Chitauri fell, the Avengers had converged on the tower again. Natasha Romanova was still balancing the scepter in her hands, not unconfidently but with intent concentration. Loki had peeled himself out of the floor and seemed as stunned as anyone else at his son's intervention. 

"Can't say he mentioned this," Clint said, staring up at the head blotting out the sky. "Brainwashed or not, I'd have remembered if he mentioned a giant talking... spacefaring... snake." 

"Are you well, Jormungand?" Thor shouted. Jormungand was _not_ usually spacefaring. Thor seriously doubted the other side of the portal was hard vacuum -- the winds had been all wrong for that, and the Chitauri vehicles and bodies had made the transition with no obvious problems -- but he wasn't sure what it _had_ been or what kind of weapons might have been brought to bear.

Jormungand courteously lowered his head so that one bright blue-green eye was roughly level with the tower. It didn't appear to be bleeding. "I am _victorious_." 

Thor laughed. "So you are." 

"Wait a minute," Erik said. "I thought you two were supposed to be enemies."

Thor and Jormungand both looked at him, then at each other. Jormungand offered, "He boxed my ears for trying to tackle a kraken." 

"He was much smaller at the time," Thor said helpfully. "And I wasn't sure he could swim."

"And Thor is, after all," Loki said, "so very well known for his prudent choice of battles." 

Thor frowned at him, but Jormungand spoke first. "I do not like your new companions, Father." 

Everyone else except the Hulk looked a bit nervous, and even he glanced upward. Thor tried not to roll his eyes and muttered, "He doesn't mean you." 

Loki ignored this byplay and gave an exhausted, cracked laugh. "I'm not fond of them either."

In the distance, portions of Jormungand were still sliding back into the water. "You look terrible." 

Loki glanced at the Hulk. "My battle was less successful than yours. What, exactly, did you do?" 

Jormungand's scales flexed and shifted. "I swallowed their flagship. Then I smelled out their two kings and swallowed them up too." 

Everyone looked somewhat queasy at this, Loki included. "I'm not sure your time in the ocean has been good for your mental state," Loki muttered, at which point everybody turned to stare at _him_.

"Would you have me cough them back up?" Jormungand asked irritably. 

"That actually might be a good idea," Thor said. True, Loki was in no condition to comment on other people's mental health, but he did have a point. "Although perhaps not right _here_ ," he added hastily. "Killing them in battle was appropriate, and it was probably an understandable, er, method, but feeding on people would be a poor precedent. And I can't imagine the ship is very digestible." 

Loki laughed again, rather more wildly. "Oh, why shouldn't he? We're all monsters here." 

Thor rubbed his forehead and tried not to groan. "Loki...."

Jormungand looked rather hurt. "You once made a point of teaching me I was _not_." 

"I have learned the truth, since." Loki paced a few steps, then whirled. Natasha tensed a bit and leveled the scepter. "Would it make you feel better to know my father cast me out as your mother did to you?" 

"What _are_ you talking about?"

"I, too, was born to Jotunheim. To _Laufey_." Loki's voice was strained and raw, and he spat the name. "Odin found me. I suppose that's why he was so sure your strange form, and your siblings', could not be due to being _half_ -Jotun." 

Jormungand rippled in a shrug. "What of it?" 

"Come to think of it," Loki said, staring up at him, "I'm really even more mystified by that now...."

"I am mystified by your trying to conquer my home with an army of aliens you don't even get along with," Jormungand said, evidently feeling that this was a more interesting topic than his admittedly perplexing species. 

Loki pressed the heels of his hands to his eyebrows, then winced slightly and pulled one of them away to eye the blood on it. "It's a long story." 

"He reacted poorly to the revelation," Thor explained. Erik made a faint choking noise. "He let Jotun warriors into the Vault to try to steal the Casket of Ancient Winters back--"

"That was before!" Loki snapped.

"That does not help your case," Thor muttered. At Jormungand's low growl, he considered that his nephew presumably _also_ still considered himself a citizen of Asgard, and stepped slightly in front of his brother. "Not knowing he was responsible for the incursion, I took him and our friends to Jotunheim -- against Odin's commands -- to investigate, and embroiled us in a battle, provoking Laufey to declare war. For this disobedience, and for my heedlessness of the lives I was responsible for, I was banished here to Midgard until I should learn better--"

"I knew you were here. You might have come to say hello." 

Thor paused, blinking. "Until I was able to redeem my fault and be considered worthy of bearing Mjolnir again, I was rendered mortal. I was not placed near an ocean." A rueful look. "And I'm afraid I did not give due credit to the legends that you wrapped the entire planet in your coils. You've grown quite a bit." 

Jormungand's scales shimmered. He looked pleased. 

"While I was gone," Thor resumed, "Loki lured Laufey to an attempt on Odin's life and killed him, then used the Bifrost to attack Jotunheim. I destroyed it and he fell into the Void. We knew not that he was alive until he reappeared on Earth." 

"You have been busy." Jormungand eyed Loki. "I think you should go home." 

"I have no home." 

Thor started to protest, but it was really impossible to talk over Jormungand. "You are of Asgard. Grandfather and Grandmother surely miss you." A brief pause. "You remember how it hurt _you_ to be divided from your children." Hel's deadly touch, Fenrir's more willing lethality, Jormungand's own size. 

"I'm _not theirs_ ," Loki snarled. "Weren't you listening?" 

"You are theirs as Midgard is mine," Jormungand said -- impatiently, as if this were obvious and any dispute nonsensical. 

Loki rocked back on his heels, evidently unsure how to address this novel argument. He caught Thor's eyes, but Thor wasn't quite sure what to do with it himself. "You are our family in everything _but_ blood," he tried instead. "And spilling blood will not change that." 

"Odin made his disappointment _quite clear_ \--"

Jormungand rumbled over them again, "Do you think he loves you less than you love Fenrir?" 

Loki and Thor both stared up at him. Tyr had fostered Loki's unruly wolf-son until Fenrir declared his intention to devour Odin and rule Asgard in his stead. Fearing to lose both father and son, Loki had tricked him into chains, with Tyr's hand freely given as the price. Thor opened his mouth to say he wasn't sure that parallel was exactly encouraging, but then he saw that there were tears in Loki's eyes again. 

"Or than Tyr does?" Jormungand added, and Loki crumbled to the rooftop, left hand around his right wrist, and wept. 

The other Avengers shifted, even Clint, and looked away. Erik didn't, for longer than a moment. Thor went to his brother and sat down beside him. He took a few moments to relieve Loki of the several most obvious hidden knives, tossed them in a small heap that Natasha eyed with interest, and then set an arm around his shoulders and sat with him until the worst of the storm had passed.


End file.
